1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to a method and a device for automatically allocating channels of a wireless network system, and more particularly to a method and a device provided with an access point (AP) for collecting channel status information of other access points (APs) in a wireless network system followed by calculating which one channel is the better channel via a Network Management Server (NMS) for controlling said access point to use the better channel for the purpose of automatically allocating channels of the wireless network system.
2. Description of the Prior Art
Presently, due to human life having more and more needs to the portability of electronic information apparatus and the real-time transmission of electronic information, various wireless communication functions have become one of requisites when a consumer wants to buy an electronic information apparatus.
Traditionally, a communication system of Wireless Local Access Network (WLAN) is provided to integrate radio frequency (RF) technologies with network technologies, so that users not only can access Internet information without using any physical network cables, but also the users can access the Internet information by connecting other network devices via the WLAN. Even though the communication system of the WLAN can be used to provide the accessing convenience, it still exist a disadvantage that the communication system thereof is not provided with any physical network cables to connect each of Access Points (APs) which provide transmission services of wireless information with each of terminal devices of the users. Thus, it is an important issue for related manufacturers to think how to stably control and allocate communication channels between each of the APs and each of the terminal devices for lowering the interference with each other and improving the overall efficiency of the communication system of the WLAN.
Nowadays, two conventional methods for allocating communication channels of a plurality of access points (APs) within a common WLAN are used. One of the conventional methods is to manually set a corresponding operation channel for each of the APs in turn by a network administrator, and the other thereof is to automatically set a corresponding operation channel for each of the APs via a built-in program of each of the APs. Apparently, the conventional method of manually setting the operation channel is a relatively uneconomical management, and it is difficult for the network administrator to be on call 24 hours and continuously adjust the corresponding operation channel for each of the APs in the network according to the variation of operation status on different times. In another aspect, although the conventional method of automatically setting the operation channel by each of the APs may increase the management convenience, it still exists other disadvantages. For examples, because each of the APs respectively allocates a corresponding channel in an independent manner, it is difficult for the network administrator to adjust or control rules or conditions for allocating channels of an entire WLAN, i.e. it only can provide limited operation flexibility, and can not be used to optimize the channel allocations. Furthermore, when the operation status of the network varies (for example, one of the APs or one of channels suddenly receives excess data transmission requests, or the amount of the APs suddenly increases or decreases), the conventional method still can not immediately and actively adjust nor re-allocate the operation channel of each of the APs, so that the overall efficiency of the communication system of WLAN can not be remarkably improved.
It is therefore tried by the inventor to develop a method and a device for automatically allocating channels of a wireless network system to solve the problems existing in the conventional methods for allocating communication channels as described above.